In response to my having posted
this article by Mr Thomas Peters onto facebook, one of my (Protestant) friends writes (with my emphasis and links):
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understand that Catholics are not encouraged to actually read the Bible ;) (Ok, in all fairness I think that might have changed with Vatican II) but many of the Biblical points the author makes are valid, unless the Catholic Bible is seriously different than the ones we Protestants use. Polygamy is fairly common in the Old Testament, see for example King David, and Paul was rather anti-marriage, saying it was better to remain married, except for all those sinful thoughts that build up in the weak, so if you are too weak to remain pure then marriage should be your recourse. As for burning women, I suppose that could also mean witch hunts, or various other women that have been burned either by the Catholic church, or in the name of the Catholic church (though the latter becomes a bit trickier), just a guess... Of course, the article makes some good points about the author's blatant logical fallacies, so I am not saying I fully disagree with the article. In summary, it seems that both sides of this argument are writing from their highly specific point of view, which kind of undermines both their claims to have access to an impartial "actual" reality. Don't get me wrong, I believe that one exists, I am just not seeing it very near to that argument.
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I'm not preparing to write a long rebuttal of all these charges. For example, many most of the Duoay-Rheims Bibles in print also contain this
papal encyclical which encourages Catholics to read their Bibles. It was written by Pope Leo XIII, well before Vatican II. Let's examine the two points about marriage more closely (this will be a bit more long-winded).
First, there is the point about polygamy in the Old Testament: it was, after all, practiced by such characters s Kings Saul, David, and Solomon. Ah, but what does Mr Thorp actually write about this?
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Brandon K Thorp wrote:
"The form of marriage the Church ultimately propounded — indissoluble, monogamous, and with a dowry — became the template for modern Western matrimony. You’ll note that [Archbishop] Wenski implies, but doesn’t quite say, that these monogamous, heterosexual marriages have been the norm in recorded history. Wenski doesn’t quite say it because it’s a lie. Wenski’s own holy books document a long history of polygamy, most of which was approved by Wenski’s god [sic.]" (emphasis mine).
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Was polygamy actually approved of by God, for the most part? It's certainly not in the New Testament, where St Paul instructs us that "yet to avoid immorality every man should have his own wife and every woman her own husband" (1 Corinthians 7:2). More about Saint Paul's views on marriage in a moment. If every man should have his own wife, this implies that women should not have multiple husbands; and if every woman should have her own husband, this likewise implies that men should not have multiple wives.
Of course, that charge is that polygamy is prevalent in the Old Testament, and that it "was approved by...God." Here is what the Catechesism has to say about polygamy in the Old Testament:
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Catechism of the Catholic Church wrote:
"Moral conscience concerning the unity and indissolubility of marriage developed under the pedagogy of the old law. In the Old Testament the polygamy of patriarchs and kings is not yet explicitly rejected. Nevertheless, the law given to Moses aims at protecting the wife from arbitrary domination by the husband, even though according to the Lord's words it still carries traces of man's "hardness of heart" which was the reason Moses permitted men to divorce their wives" (CCC 1610).
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Polygamy was "not yet explicitly rejected." The implication is that it may have been implicitly rejected. I take the view that it was. To see how, we should look not at King David but at his son, Solomon:
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"He had seven hundred wives of royal rank and three hundred concubines. When Solomon grew old his wives swayed his heart to other gods; and his heart was not wholly with Yahweh his God as his father David's had been" (1 Kings 11:34).
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His wives swayed his heart to other gods. Sure, it could be said that the sin was in turning away from God--and this was the biggest of his sins--but it was his many wives who did this to him. This was, of course, foretold by Moses: "Nor must [your king] keep on acquiring more and more wives, for that could lead his heart astray" (Deutoronomy 17:17). I could go on, but it's worth instead skipping forward to the New Testament, in which Our LORD Himself insists that marriage is to be between one man and one woman:
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"He answered, 'Have you not read that the Creator from the beginning made them male and female and that he said: This is why a man leaves his father and mother and becomes attached to his wife, and the two become one flesh? They are no longer two, therefore, but one flesh. So then, what God has united, human beings must not divide.'
They said to him, 'Then why did Moses command that a writ of dismissal should be given in cases of divorce?'
He said to them, 'It was because you were so hard-hearted, that Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but it was not like this from the beginning. Now I say this to you: anyone who divorces his wife -- I am not speaking of an illicit marriage -- and marries another, is guilty of adultery.'" (Matthew 19:4-9).
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What was the condition "from the beginning?" Here Our LORD (read: GOD Himself) is citing from Genesis, at which time there was one man and one woman. It was because of the hardness of their hearts that they were permitted to divorce their wives--or to take more than one. He hardly speaks of polygamy in an approving manner here--it was tolerated, but not "approved".
But why would God tolerate polygamy among the patriarchs and kings of old? Here I can only speculate. It is worth noting, however, that the first five books of the Bible--Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy--are believed to have had Moses as their human author.Before these books, there was no bible in any form, no scriptures of any type. The book of Genesis in turn chronicles not only the Creation (and Fall) of man, but also the pre-history of Israel, from Adam and Eve to Noah and the flood, and from Noah and the flood to the patriarchs: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob. During these times, there was no recorded divine Law, for the simple reason that we have no records from these people. We don't know what was or wasn't revealed to them, beyond what is recorded for us by Moses and in snippets elsewhere in the scriptures and other writings (and oral traditions).
We do know that there was a sort of covenant with Adam and Eve. To the serpent, at least, was the promise that "I shall put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; it will bruise your head and you will strike its heel'" (Genesis 3:15). Here is the first promise, veiled as it was, that a Redeemer would come. But in the meantime, they were banished from the Garden of Eden, with little more than the so-called cursed (pain in childbearing, that the land would be fertile only through man's struggle; see Genesis 3:16-19, 24). The only commandment which they had received, and which was still binding was to "Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. Be masters of the fish of the sea, the birds of heaven and all the living creatures that move on earth" (Genesis 1:28). ore revelation than this had not yet been given either way.
To Noah was given another covenant. "Never again will I curse the earth because of human beings, because their heart contrives evil from their infancy. Never again will I strike down every living thing as I have done" (Genesis 8:21). To Noah were given this covenant and these commandments:
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"God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, 'Breed, multiply and fill the earth. Be the terror and the dread of all the animals on land and all the birds of heaven, of everything that moves on land and all the fish of the sea; they are placed in your hands. Every living thing that moves will be yours to eat, no less than the foliage of the plants. I give you everything, with this exception: you must not eat flesh with life, that is to say blood, in it. And I shall demand account of your life-blood, too. I shall demand it of every animal, and of man. Of man as regards his fellow-man, I shall demand account for human life. He who sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for in the image of God was man created. Be fruitful then and multiply, teem over the earth and subdue it!'
God spoke as follows to Noah and his sons, 'I am now establishing my covenant with you and with your descendants to come, and with every living creature that was with you: birds, cattle and every wild animal with you; everything that came out of the ark, every living thing on earth. And I shall maintain my covenant with you: that never again shall all living things be destroyed by the waters of a flood, nor shall there ever again be a flood to devastate the earth.'
'And this', God said, 'is the sign of the covenant which I now make between myself and you and every living creature with you for all ages to come: I now set my bow in the clouds and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth" (Genesis 9:1-13).
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Note on the one hand the covenant--symbolized by the rainbow--but on the other hand, note the commandments. Noah and his sons and their wives were to breed, multiple, fill the earth and be its masters, and also to abstain from blood*. At this point in time, nothing more had been revealed to them about the coming of a Savior, nor was any more revealed about the moral Law. This does not make the transgression of Noah's son against his father any better in in Noah's sight (see Genesis 9:21-29), even though the Law itself was not recorded until the time of Moses (honor thy father and thy mother is, of course, remembered as the fourth commandment by Catholic or the fifth by Protestants). That is to say, Ham transgressed the law despite it's not being explicitly known by him. The law had not yet been revealed to the Israelites, and yet it did still exist in latent form.
Moving forward to the Patriarchs--Abram/Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob--recall that the time of Moses and the prophets was still many centuries away. There was thus still no codified moral law for these patriarchs, beyond the simple one which had been handed down from Noah, and beyond the Law written on the hearts of men (see Romans 2:14-15). Yet here for the first time we see a just man taking not only a wife but also a sort of concubine: Abraham was married to Sarai/Sarah, but also had a child by Hagar. Recall, however, that Abraham was made to send Hagar away with their son Ishmael (see Genesis chapters 16 and 17), apparently with the approval of God (an angel of the LORD did command Hagar to submit to Sarai, who was a bit jealous of her, see 16:4-13). Abraham did have a second wife--Keturah--but only after Sarah had died (Genesis 24:67 and 25:1). Isaac in turn had but one wife--she with the lovely name of Rebekah-- and no concubines. His sons each married to women--Jacob because he was cheated (Genesis 28:18-27), and Esau married Judith and Basemath, both "disappointments" to his parents (Genesis 26:34-35), and also Mahaleth daughter of Ishmael (Genesis 28:9).
None of this really points to God's "approving" of polygamy. What is does do is suggest that it had become established custom among the patriarchs of Israel, and that moreover it was established in large part by less-than-honorable means. This does not, however, suggest that God "approved" of polygamy or found it to be "moral," any more than His silence in the case of Ham meant a tacit "approval" of his not honoring his father, nor His "approval" of Abram's fornication with Hagar. By the time the Law was written down and established by Noah, polygamy was therefore a long-held custom, shared in by one of the patriarchs (Jacob), if only because he was cheated. Thus could kings like David and Solomon and their sons point back to the founding of Israel (that is, back to the patriarch Jacob) and say that they were only following in his lead, and that, after all, the Law permits divorce and does not forbid polygamy: a seeming tacit approval of polygamy.
There is something of this in Christ's discussion of marriage as monogamous (and lifelong-permanent). In the meantime, when Christ gives His answer about divorce to the scribes and pharisees, He says, "It was because you were so hard-hearted, that Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but it was not like this from the beginning" (Matthew 19:8). It was due to the hardness of their hearts, their insisting on retaining this custom that allowed polygamy in the Old Testament. These are hardly words of 'approval."
But notice something else about our LORD's reply. He says that it was Moses, and not necessarily God, who permitted a bill of divorce. God disapproved of this "from the beginning," but Moses relented in the face of the Israelites' hard-heartedness. After all, Moses still retained his own free will in composing the first five books of Scripture, even if writing under inspiration; it seems to me that it was Moses and not God who was approving of polygamy. God, for His part, did not punish this sin directly--perhaps He decided that the bickering among the spouses was punishment enough?--but rather bided His time. Revelation was not, after all, anywhere near completion during the time of Moses or even of Kings David and Solomon.
It would not be for over a thousand years--during the time of the apostles--that public revelation would finally be complete. He thus had plenty of time to show his disapproval of polygamy, which He ultimately did both in person (that is, in the person of Christ) and through His apostle Saint Paul. I will conclude this part of my discussion here, but would like to return to the figure of Saint Paul in the near future to discuss his views on marriage, to take up the charge of his being "anti-marriage."
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*A Foreshadowing of the Eucharistic feast, in which the commandment is reversed in so far as we are told to eat of Christ's flesh and drink of His blood (see John 6:54-71).
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Originally posted on my
Equus Nom Veritas blog.
Tags: Marriage Culture Culture-of-Life Catechesis Interpretation Exegesis
